Other writers have covered the hysteria at Emory University over someone writing “Trump 2016” on the campus with chalk (see here and here). But this sign claiming chalk is murder shows just how seriously these college students take “micro-aggressions.”

The university actually offered students free “counseling” after the chalk messages appeared. Since hysterical people can sometimes be helped by counseling to learn to not by paralyzed by irrational emotions, I suppose that is appropriate. However, this story makes me think that the counseling was more likely to endorse the hysteria as rational.

That same story also claims that, “One student held a sign in the middle of Asbury Circle Thursday, satirically claiming chalk intimidates and can even kill.”

But the reporter doesn’t seem to have realized it was satire at first. And why would she? The term “micro-aggression” is aimed at interpreting speech as a criminal attack. Everything about the way the students and the administration are acting makes it clear they think a statement in favor of a certain political candidate counts as a crime that should be punished.

Of course, the entire protest at Emory is premised on the idea that stopping illegal immigration and making sure that we don’t admit jihadist killers into this country counts as an attack on American citizens and legal residents. That not only makes no sense but could lead to a damaging outcome. It is going to make people wonder why some loud racial minorities are so eager to identify themselves with illegal aliens and Islamic terrorists. For all the faults he may have, Donald Trump has never suggested anything bad about minorities. (Neither has Ted Cruz )

Joe Scudder is the "nom de plume" (or "nom de guerre") of a fifty-ish-year-old writer and stroke survivor. He lives in St Louis with his wife and still-at-home children. He has been a freelance writer and occasional political activist since the early nineties. He describes his politics as Tolkienesque.